


Legacy

by papersandals (laronmi)



Category: Kingdom Hearts
Genre: Gen, Training
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-29
Updated: 2013-04-29
Packaged: 2017-12-09 21:03:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,276
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/777958
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/laronmi/pseuds/papersandals
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The two of them fight in different ways, hold back in different ways, and frustrate her in different ways.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Legacy

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on my tumblr. Could take place after KH2 or DDD. Lightly edited and changed. I still don't know how to describe Riku's playing style, especially since it feels different in DDD compared to the other games.

The two of them fight in vastly different ways.

Sora fights on instinct, wild and nearly unpredictable, with an uncanny ability to take an enemy's move and transform it into something that assists him. He isn't one to stay back and plan, but rather prefers to react on the fly, countering and rolling with the punches. It's a battle style that's rough and unrefined, yet in the midst of a fight, Sora flows like water, trickling around, over, through, and between the obstacles in his way. It's what makes him dangerous, that unpredictability and adaptability, and he has never once used it in full against her.

When Sora fights Kairi, he holds back so much that he becomes stiff. He's gentle with his attacks, slow with his responses, and so frustratingly hesitant that Kairi once took full advantage of this and keybladed him in the side as hard as she could.

He gets better, a little bit, about not holding back, but it still isn't enough.

Riku fights with biting precision and an uncanny ability to target his opponent's vulnerability and overwhelm them. He takes his time in the beginning of fights, watching and waiting until he understands how the opponent moves, how they attack, how they defend, what they're weak against—Riku sees it all with frightening speed, and he moves even faster. It's a battle style that's terrifyingly effective, and Riku is ruthless and merciless in battle. It's what makes him dangerous, that ruthless efficiency, yet he has never once used it in full against her.

When Riku fights Kairi, he scales himself back just enough to be a nuisance. By now, he's more than familiarized himself with how she fights, and in their practice battles, he always manages to stay just a little bit ahead of her. She appreciates it, she really does, but it's also frustrating to fight with him because he keeps doing the same thing, over and over, only giving enough to keep her on her toes but never enough to actually challenge her. Once, just once, she'd like her defeat to be overwhelming, rather than handed to her on a silver plate with victory dangling just above her head.

They fight in different ways, hold back in different ways, and frustrate her in different ways. She knows that they both have years of experience on her, that she should appreciate what they're doing, but Sora treats her like glass and Riku is being unknowingly condescending, and Kairi's had enough.

So she asks them both to fight her at the same time.

"Are you sure about this?" Sora asks, glancing over to Riku like he wants him to back him up. "You've never fought against two people at once before."

"That's why I want to do it," she says, planting one hand on her hip as her other grips her keyblade. "Fighting you one-on-one is okay, but there's usually not just one opponent out there, right? I need to practice multiple targets."

"She's got a point," Riku says before Sora can respond. "When she's out in a real battle, the Heartless aren't going to wait in a neat little line for her to finish them off."

"Yeah, but," Sora pouts, "Heartless aren't like us."

"They're a lot weaker than you two, so if I can get used to fighting against the two of you at the same time, then the Heartless should be no problem."

The appeal to his pride works, and Sora drops his protests, although he looks like he wants to say more. Riku, meanwhile, is watching both of them carefully, and she's long recognized the look he gets when he's thinking of a strategy. She smiles at the both of them, hefts her keyblade up, and goes into a battle stance.

"Well?" Kairi asks. "On the count of three?"

The other two shift into their battle ready positions, and she counts off. On three, she rushes them both, and it's Sora, surprisingly, who meets her first. Her keyblade clashes against his, pushes him back, and she's disappointed and frustrated in him as he slides backwards.

"Sora," she cries. "Come on!"

"I am," he whines, and then he moves in again. She blocks way too easily, and she's about to reprimand him again when Riku suddenly moves in on her left, lashing out vertically with Way to the Dawn. She dodges, but only barely, and his keyblade leaves a faint scratch on her arm, too shallow to even draw blood.

Sora's mouth is wide open. "Riku! Be careful!"

"I am." Riku huffs with exasperation, and he's on the move again, going in with an overhead strike, and Kairi manages to get her keyblade up just in time to block. The clang of keyblade striking against keyblade is loud, and her arms tremble with the amount of force needed to keep his blade at bay (yet she can still hold him off).

She tries to keep her eyes on Riku, because if he sees her break eye contact even for a moment, she knows that he'll rush in with another attack that she'll be able to barely see (but still see) coming. However, Sora's pouting in the distance, and his disappointment is so palpable that Kairi can't help but to look.

"Stop pouting," Riku shouts to him, and the pressure on her keyblade is suddenly gone. "How are we supposed to spar when you're making a face like that?"

He steps back, and, to her surprise, walks back to where Sora is. The two of them begin to bicker loudly and energetically, and Kairi can only look on from afar as their bickering begins to escalate into the two of them sparring with one another, limbs loose and blows coming quickly, each of them reacting to the other without even thinking—

She grips the hilt of her keyblade tightly with trembling hands and tries hard not to scream.

She's angry. Angry at them for keeping her out, for not taking her seriously, for not treating her the way they treat each other, for still treating her as a princess and prize first and a person second. She's angry at herself for not being able to make her point, for not being able to make them see, for being jealous and bitter—

She closes her eyes and takes deep breaths, concentrating on the feeling of her blade beneath her fingers. She tries to steady her arms, but they won't stop shaking, and she realizes that this anger—this genuine, terrifying anger that a Princess of Heart isn't supposed to feel—could be tempered. Could be strength.

She isn't afraid of the darkness because she knows the darkness cannot touch her.

So she keeps her eyes closed and listens to the two of the spar, to the sound of their keyblades clashing with one another's at rapid fire pace, to the sound of their feet stirring up the sand as they jump around each other, and she sees. She sees where they are, knows what they're doing, and it's only a matter of reaching inside herself and seeing—watching someone (who?) fight, surrounded by over a dozen creatures (what?) and fending them off with their (her?) keyblade, wrapping themselves in a barrier and _charging_ , tearing through the crowd as Kairi stood back and watched them (them?) fight.

She can do that. She can wrap herself in a Reflect spell and then _lunge_ , running towards her boys with a scream leaping out of her throat, a warning that catches them off guard as she shoves herself in between their attacks.

It doesn't work like it does in her vision (memory?), but it is enough to send the boys toppling to the sand, both of them staring at her with wide eyes. As for her, she's breathing heavily and there's a strange weight in her heart, something sad and heavy that she can't quite understand.

"Woah," she hears Sora say, and before she can try to grab at that weight, he's standing in front her and grabbing her by the shoulders. "That's so cool! Where did you learn that? Riku?"

"I," Riku starts, but he shakes his head and just gapes at her instead. "No. I didn't teach her that."

She swallows down the ache. "Will you two actually train me, now? I know that I'm not as strong as the two of you or as experienced, but I'm serious about this, and I wish you two would be serious about me!"

Sora looks taken aback, and Riku's expression is simultaneously closed off and as open as a book—eyes wide enough to tell her everything's he thinking, yet his face is stone still and devoid of any other sign of emotion.

"We do take you seriously," Sora says, and she shakes her head.

"No, you don't. You treat me like I'm going to break if you apply even the tiniest amount of pressure, and you," she says to Riku, "can be so condescending that it makes me feel like I'm hopeless sometimes."

"I," Riku begins, and there is a look of panic and horror creeping up his face. "I never meant— Kairi, I'm so sorry—"

"I know that I'm not as strong as you," she says, and she's surprised to taste tears in her mouth when she speaks, "but you don't have to taunt me with victory and then give me defeat. I appreciate you pushing me, but it hurts when I realize that you'll never give me anything more than I can handle until the end.

"I just want the two of you to treat me like you do each other. I want you two to trust me to let me take care of myself."

Her keyblade vanishes from her hands then, and she openly sobs. She buries her face in her hands, and then Sora's wrapping his arms around her, Riku quickly standing and doing the same. She grips their arms tightly and cries, not just because of her frustration but also because the weight in her heart is almost unbearable now.

"I don't want to hurt you," Sora whispers, and Kairi punches him as hard as she can.

"You won't. Wounds and scratches will heal. You can't hurt me by treating me like an equal, but you can hurt me by treating me like a...like a princess."

"You are a princess, though." This time, Riku joins her in punching him, and Sora whines loudly in her ears.

"You're not any better," she sniffs at Riku, and his arms tighten around her. "You don't treat me like glass, but you never challenge me. You always give me just enough time to see something coming, or attack with just enough force for me to keep you at bay. You don't think when you fight Sora because you're so used to him that you have to think, but every time we spar, you treat me like an equation."

"I didn't mean to," he says, and he sounds ashamed of himself. "I want to push you, but I don't want to overwhelm you."

"Maybe I want to be overwhelmed," she retorts. "Maybe I do want to actually see how behind I am. You can't expect me to get better if you only push me enough to keep me at the level I am now."

"So you want me to kick your butt?"

"Sometimes. Sora, this applies to you too."

"But I'd feel bad if I wiped the floor with you."

She bites back the first reply that pops into mind and settles for shoving him gently, breaking the three of them apart. "Do you feel bad when you wipe the floor with Riku?"

"No," Sora admits as Riku protests.

"Then don't feel bad with me."

"But," Sora says, and he looks back and forth between her and Riku uncomfortably for a moment. "But you're _Kairi_."

She summons her keyblade and throws it at him. He yelps, dodge rolls out of the way, and then stares at her incredulously as she summons her keyblade back into her hand.

"I don't feel bad about kicking your butt," she points out, "and I won't when I get stronger than you and Riku and leave you two in the dust."

Sora's pouting again and Riku's trying to disguise his laughter in the form of a cough, so she casts Aero and sends them both flying towards opposite ends of the beach.

"I'm serious!" she yells, and Sora removes his face from the sand. He's staring at her like she's grown another head, and the tilt of his head is all the warning she gets before she feels Riku swipe at her with his keyblade.

She mostly dodges. There's a scratch on her arm now, one that's bleeding, and Riku's watching her intently, keyblade poised to fight and guilt in his eyes. She looks him in the eyes, makes sure he can understand that it's all right, that she wants this, and smiles.

"All right," she says as she casts Reflect again in order to try that move she couldn't get earlier again, but the barrier causes Sora's attack to bounce harmlessly away from her. She hides her surprise and pretends that she meant to do that, but they see through her.

"Sure you don't want to go one-on-one again?" Riku asks with a purposefully and painfully condescending smirk on his face, and Kairi shakes her head.

"Never," she says. She grins and charges in.

 

_One day when you're in trouble, the light within you will lead you to the light of another. Someone to keep you safe._

_Someone to teach you how to keep yourself safe._


End file.
